Babies' milestones not so easy to track

Parenting in the real world has often more shades of grey than brilliant Kodachrome.

Have Kodak, Hollywood and Hallmark given parents inflated expectations surrounding their babies' milestones?

By:Scott ColbyParenting,Late in the Game, Published on Mon Sep 30 2013

When was your daughter’s first step?

Hard to say.

What was your son’s first word?

Could have been book. Might have been ball.

I thought these milestones in our twin babies’ lives would be more momentous.

Is it Kodak, Hollywood and Hallmark that give us these expectations?

Parenting in the real world has often more shades of grey than brilliant Kodachrome.

In the first step category, we have to decipher a first step from the first let-go-of-the-coffee-table-stumble.

Popcorn and Sweet Pea could pull themselves up in the crib months before they could walk. Does it count if they are holding my hands as they inch forward with shaky steps? What about when Sweet Pea took a turn around the ottoman and finally let go, falling into my outstretched arms? Was that a step? To me she was just falling forward.

Regardless, I have no idea when this happened. Nothing is recorded.

My wife and I had good intentions, but we have not had time to keep a baby book or journal.

We do have thousands of time-stamped photos and iPhone videos that form a patchwork record of their development and achievements.

First words are even harder to decode. Popcorn, in particular, can be a real chatter box. Most of it is just babbling, but some of it sounds like real words.

He definitely was saying book around Easter. But did he mean book? He has lots of books, which he and his sister devour — literally. Sweet Pea’s favourite snack is the cardboard corner of a good children’s book.

Popcorn and his sister have foam balls, beach balls, a mini football and tennis balls to play with. He knows the word. We can say, “Go get the green ball” and he’ll find the green ball and try to roll it to us.

His default word for everything is “ba,” which can sound a lot like ball. Did he say ball? I think so. Did he mean ball?

Now, at 15 months, he says Mama all the time. If I’m with him I quickly correct him. “No, I’m Daddy.” More often than not, he’ll reply Dada. I’m still not convinced my children know who Daddy is. If my wife says, “Where is Daddy?” they look to the backdoor, where I come in every evening after locking up my bike. They do this even when I’m on the floor playing with them. Does Daddy mean backdoor to them?

We remember when their first teeth came in. It was the bottom front teeth. Sweet Pea had hers first and her brother’s “erupted” soon afterwards. While feeding our babies recently we noticed molars!

When did those come in? How could we have missed that? No wonder they were drooling so much. We’re terrible parents.

Natasha successfully captured on iPhone video the first time Sweet Pea rolled over. One day our daughter started making strange motions that appeared as though she was looking dramatically over her shoulder while lying on her back. Natasha grabbed her iPhone.

It’s like watching a flower bloom in stop-action photography as she slowly manages to flip herself onto her stomach, but her right arm is pinned under her body. She grunts and is clearly frustrated, but finally, exhausted from the effort, feebly pulls her arm free. Victory.

This is soon followed by cries of frustration because she is stuck on her stomach now.

Popcorn was the first to pull himself up in the crib, but he could not figure out how to get back down again. He would finally tire, let go and fall stiff as a tree backward — smack — Whaa!

Sweet Pea, meanwhile, cautiously squatted while trying to figure out how to stand. Then one day she was doing it, up and down, bending her knees. Popcorn finally caught on.

We are at the stage now where new “firsts” are reached all the time: the latest is eating with a spoon. Occasionally food makes it into a mouth, but more often on the ground.

A day to remember will be the first day we don’t have to mop a meal off the floor.

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